Well it's the holidays and I've been shopping a bit on eBay. I keep seeing uncleaned coin lots offering unsearched, dirt-covered coins from Roman/Greek caches. Are these lots the same kind of gimmick as "unsearched" wheat cent rolls in US collecting? I wouldn't mind cleaning up some older coins and doing some attributing. However, I don't want to get "taken" as I am completely naive to ancients. If these things are legit, what is a fair price per coin? I'm assuming the price depends on the average coin size, correct? Also, are there any dealers that sell stuff like this that are not on feebay? Any other info would be appreciated and thanks in advance.
You would be much better buying a few idetified or identifiable cleaned but common coins. Uncleaned coins and their cleaning is a specialized hobby with many 'unsearched wheat rolls' type pitfalls. Genuine ancient coins can be found for a dollar or a million dollars. Decent common ones might be $10 to $100. Learning the differences make it better to avoid betting your unsearched coins will be worth a fraction of what people charge
unless what you seek is the fun of washing dirt off coins and hoping your luck will be better than it is reasonable to expect.
I think everybody should try uncleaned coin lots at least once in their lives. Especially really dirty coins, where it's hard to tell what lies beneath the gunk. One of my first ever eBay purchases was a group of 100 uncleaned Greek coins. When I received them I was initially disappointed - they were so small (my first lesson as a newbie: always ask the size of coins!). I left them alone for a few months, and came back to them, and started cleaning and what I found fascinated me. I found coins of Seleucid rulers and Judean prutah. It was awesome. I continued to buy uncleaned coins. In most lots of Roman uncleaned coins you will keep finding the same things - 95% Constantine Dynasty, which will get boring after a while. I used to be able to get lots of "large" Roman uncleaneds, which generally turned out to be 1st-3rd century provincials, with well worn imperial bronzes (as/dupondius/sestertius). A caveat - no uncleaned coins are truly "unsearched", having passed through many hands before they reach the eBay buyer. You'll never find gold. If you do if for long enough, you'll occasionally find silver.
When I stop and think about it, washing the dirt off does seem like a cool part of it. Sitting around for it to dissolve in olive oil kinda reminds me of waiting for a Chia Pet to grow. I wouldn't do it though if odds are I'm more likely to find the equivalent of a bunch of 40's and 50's common date wheat cents in an "unsearched" roll. In that same analogy, is it possibly for these coins to be "re-covered" in dirt to make them appear legit, or am I just being paranoid?
I've never had any real interest in unlearned lots. I think you should listen to Doug. Buy some coins that you can tell what they are. They'll be much more enjoyable.
My first ancients were a group of four uncleaned coins that needed a few months in olive oil before any detail was visible. Three of the four wound up with visible details and two of them were good enough to put into flips. They were my only ancient coins until most of the crud came off and then I was hooked on ancients. That lot was six dollars, shipped, so we were about as close to risk-free as you can get. I've only bought one other lot and that was a dud (a bunch of tiny slugs), but the feeling that I was (probably) the first person to see the surface of the coin in almost two thousand years was real and very cool.
Yes they do everything to make a buck. At the same time there are many honest sellers and YOU CAN FIND DECENT BUT PROBABLY MORE COMMON COINS. (always look at the sellers feedback with previous sales) If you wan't the good stuff or rarer varieties then you have to spend the extra money for what they are worth. Its a fun hobby either way and this is just my opinion.
I've cleaned thousands over the last 15 years and you can find some on eBay, but the great lots left long ago as regulation and competition tightened. Your best bet for detail will be late Roman's because they are very very common. I recommend finding a seller that only sells coins, better yet if uncleaned is all they do. You may be disappointed with a lot that comes from a seller that sells something other than ancient coins. Also look at the photos, they should show you the actual lot. Look for some detail where you can, such as a head, lettering is best. With that said coins do come out of the ground and it is possible to purchased true uncleaned, but they will have been picked through. Around $2 per coin is an acceptable price for decent quality, at least that's the cheapest I know of (I used to get them for 55¢). Some sellers will list 'low grade' or 'low quality' ect which may be cheaper, but detail really suffers.
I think I'll just dip my toe in the water and go with a much smaller lot of uncleaned coins. Now that I have seen, on numerous sites, that it can take many, many months to clean via olive oil, I can definitively say that novelty would wear off after about the 100th coin. LOL. I'll try to find one that's cheap and small with details poking through to satiate this urge. Thanks all!
Get yourself some distilled water, a cup to soak the coins in, a pack of bamboo skewers and a stiff bristle brush like a tooth brush. Soak and change the water every day and at the same time work the coins with your tools.
Get yourself some distilled water, a cup to soak the coins in, a pack of bamboo skewers and a stiff bristle brush like a tooth brush. Soak and change the water every day and at the same time work the coins with your tools.
What have you got to lose? 10, 20 bucks? Give it a shot and see what you think. You may end up like Doug Smith. thinking it's a waste of time and money, or you may up end hooked, like me. (Don't let that idea frighten you; I'm not talking about appearance.) Great advice. I second it. Distilled water works better than olive oil. It's also much cheaper and less messy. Also, get a brass bristle brush, but hold off on using it initially. Do this for the first few days or so, using only the toothbrush--cut the bristles down to about 1/16 - 1/8 of an inch or so--and a little dish washing liquid until all the soft, surface dirt washes off. Once all the easy stuff has been removed you can start letting the coins soak for a week or two between cleanings. Progress will be much slower. This is when you break out the brass bristle brush. Check the coin very carefully the first time you use it (buy yourself a good coin loupe if you don't already have one) to make sure that you aren't damaging the patina. Brass is softer than bronze, so it won't scratch the metal, but every now and then you might get a coin with a very soft. light green patina, which the brass bristles can damage. But the most important thing to remember is to be patient and have fun exploring. Consider the cost of the coins as an investment in entertainment rather than in rare or valuable coins.
